Hello, I'm Paty Caratozzolo, and my project is called AI Coach. We found that students not only feel overwhelmed by technical or academic aspects but also struggle with time management. They often feel burdened by the number of tasks they have to complete and don’t know how to organize themselves.
This personalized coach helps them decide what to do each day, relieving the pressure of not knowing how to organize their time. We first conducted a survey to understand what was truly overwhelming students regarding study management. Many shared that at the beginning of the week, they set a schedule but later realize they need to reorganize or change it, and once they’ve made a plan, they feel like they’ve failed if they need to modify it.
The coach suggests new ways to organize their tasks as the week progresses. Students who participated in our exit survey mentioned that this tool helped them feel relieved of a burden, giving them more time to focus on what truly matters: studying and completing their assignments. Another issue we found is that students often wait until the last minute to submit their assignments, assuming they’ll have enough time.
This coach helps by reminding them, "We planned to complete this in 2 hours, so you should start now to meet the deadline." We conducted a simple pilot test in several courses this semester, and the feedback was that this tool has great potential.
Our next steps include improving the visual design, which is crucial because students are used to sophisticated tools. The pilot version was quite basic in terms of aesthetics. We want to incorporate an avatar that students find appealing. Initially, we considered a male and female character about the same age as our students, but feedback revealed they prefer a cartoon-like character, an animal mascot they can relate to more easily.
We’re making these adjustments and also planning to create a user guide so other teachers can use the tool without needing programming knowledge in ChatGPT. We aim to make it user-friendly and show its usefulness by enabling them to integrate it into platforms like Canvas, which all teachers use. We believe this will maximize its impact, and that’s our goal for the first semester of 2025.
To know more about this project
Professors in this episode:
PhD Patricia Caratozzolo Martelliti
Patricia is an Electronic Engineer from the School of Engineering at the University of Buenos Aires (UBA). She pursued her doctoral studies at the Polytechnic University of Catalonia in Spain, at the Institute of Industrial Robotics, with a Ph.D. thesis on electric generation systems for hybrid vehicles, completed in June 2003. She worked for several years at the National Center for Research and Technological Development (Cenidet) as a senior researcher and graduate professor, where she supervised seven master’s theses on energy control in electric and hybrid vehicles.
She has numerous publications on supervisory energy control in electric and hybrid vehicles. Currently, she is a professor and researcher in the Mechatronics Department at Tecnológico de Monterrey, Santa Fe campus, specializing in industrial electronics, automotive applications, energy efficiency, and sustainability.